Brilliant Barbara Prokopowicz and Michał Kaleta, gripping music and dance as well as the issue of a destructive power of love – a spectacle “Mamma Medea”, the first premiere in The Polish Theatre [Teatr Polski] this season.

Medea – a woman who, in the name of love, disowns her father, leaves her country, gets involved in the web of murders in which infanticide makes the climax. Tom Lanoye, a playwright whose play is produced by Monika Dobrowlańska for Malarnia stage, comes back to this mythological character.

The director shows us a very interesting spectacle balancing between a traditional ancient drama (stage design in the first part of the spectacle where its brutal scenes do not occur in front of the very audience’s eyes but are told to them) and our contemporary times. You can meet Medea all the time, she is a universal character. Dobrowlańska illustrates Medea’s falling in love with Jason and her native Colchis by means of dance and flamenco music (played alive by the guitarist Sławomir Dolata). The second part of the spectacle concentrates on the drama of a woman who, in the name of love to a man, disowned everything, even herself, but her feeling was rejected. Medea, without her beautiful coat, is not a girl blooming with love any more. She turns into a worn-out woman with suffering chiseled on her face, a woman who is, as if in madness, thrashing herself about in her coarse clothes. The tragedy can be felt in the air. Sparkles on the stage.

Dobrowlańska made a very good performance. Even though her spectacle takes nearly two hours, it is not dragging on. It rushes forward all the time, vibrant with emotions. The dynamics is owed to dance sequences and heart-breaking, piercing music played alive. The actress deserving the standing ovation is Barbara Prokopowicz who brilliantly handled her difficult role. Her change in the second part of the spectacle makes a colossal impression. In terms of artistic skills Michał Kaleta (Jason) does not fall behind. There is an incredible mixture of feelings between these two characters (and actors). What is more, there are also three brilliant roles played by Ewa Szumska. I truly recommend.”